Creating Menu Transitions

Veggie_Dave wrote on 7/6/2005, 9:56 AM
I'm obviously missing something really simple here...

DVDA2: I'm trying to follow the instructions in the manual, but I can't work out how I'm supposed to set a button's action to play the transition media..?

Each of my three buttons, main feature, chapters and extras, cannot have their 'destination chapter' changed except to either a chapter or a menu - the transition media simply isn't an option.

I know the answer's really simply, but I'm damned if I can work it out...

Comments

ScottW wrote on 7/6/2005, 10:43 AM
How did you create your buttons? Certain types of buttons cannot have their destination property changed. My guess is that your main feature button was created when you dragged the file to play onto the main menu, the chapter button was created when you did an "insert scene selection menu" and the extras button was created by "insert submenu" - how am I doing?

You've got a couple of options for doing transitions; lets start with the main feature. First, delete the main feature button from the main menu, and drag the main feature file from the explorer box into the project tree view. Now select a button from the buttons tab and drag it onto the menu. In the button properties under "action" set the destination to be the transition media that you previously included in the project. If you want a thumbnail from your movie (animated or still) go to the graphics section of the button properties and specify the movie media as the thumbnail. Now, using the project view, navigate into your transition media by double clicking on the icon. Set the end action of the media to link to your main movie.

Now when you click on the button for your feature on the menu, it will go to the transition media which will play and then will take you to the actual main feature when it ends.

Now, a transition for your scene selection and extras. Again, using the project view drag the menus from under the main menu (usually "menu 1") to the root of the project (represented by the DVD). Going back to your main menu, place 2 new buttons on the main menu and label them "Chapter" and "Extras" (or whatever).

Note - if you are going to use the same transition, then at this point you'll need to drag the transition media from the explorer window into the project two more times - I would suggest also renaming these additional instances so that they are easy to identify when you set your link properties.

Ok, going back to the "Chapter" button; set the destination to be the second instance of the transition media. Using the project view, navigate into the second transition media instance and set the end action to link to the scene selection menu.

Repeat this procedure for the "Extras" button using the appropriate instance of the transition media.

Enjoy!
--Scott
Veggie_Dave wrote on 7/7/2005, 6:16 AM
Superb! Not even remotely how it's described in the manual though...

Thank you very much indeed :-)
ScottW wrote on 7/7/2005, 6:30 AM
I've not looked at the manual recently - There are certainly many different ways to accomplish this task though, so I've no doubt that the manual is different.

<edit> well, I just looked at the DVDA help info on transitions, and it basically described the same thing I did - what it didn't tell you was how to take the existing menu structure that I assumed you had and convert it.

--Scott
Veggie_Dave wrote on 7/7/2005, 10:10 AM
It doesn't, and I had. A small but important omition I feel ;-)

Still, it works now and everything looks perfect. Yep, I'm very happy with how it looks and works now

Cheers